My campaign is still on hiatus while my day job and writing
schedule keep me too busy to plan for and think about GMing.
However, I am playing weekly in a great campaign so I'm
still getting my fix.

Recently, I picked up the D&D XBox game and my wife and I
have been enjoying it immensely. I can't say whether it's
better than pen & paper roleplaying because it's like
comparing axe beaks to ogres. However, a point of great
personal pleasure has been seeing how the D&D rules (albeit
very modified for the XBox) manifest themselves in full
colour, motion, and sound.

For example, I love seeing how the various monsters move,
hearing the noises they make, and watching their attacks and
special abilities. The drow priestesses and the mind flayers
are particularly cool. It's great inspiration!

If you're a publisher or a retailer, you're thinking about
Christmas. I still have a limited number of advertising
slots available in November and December. Recently, my
employer gave me a 4th quarter overtime heads-up, which
means I'll be very busy 'till Christmas. So, to make life
simple, I'd like to fill up the advertising schedule now so
that it's all taken care of and organized before life gets
too nuts.

If you're a games-related publisher or retailer and would
like to reach the 13,000+ readers of this ezine, I'd like to
offer you 2 for 1 rates on the remaining ad spots I have
left. For more information, contact me at:
johnn@roleplayingtips.com

NPCs are the best way for characters to interface with your
campaign in a meaningful way. In single player games, this
is important to understand because there aren't any other
gamers sitting around the table to kibitz and roleplay with.
Unless you're running a pure combat game, prepare a large
cast of non-player characters for the PC to interact with:

To advance the story

To act as plot hooks and encounter seeds

To provide aid and support

To provide clues, hints, and motivation

To help prevent the PC from getting lonely

For example, imagine a party of heroes who have just tracked
down an informant in the grey area of town. They corner him
and start demanding answers. Each PC might have questions to
pose, or perhaps the players filter all their queries
through the most charismatic PC. Either way, the informant
better speak up!

Imagine this scenario with a single PC. Is that character
intimidating or charming enough to interrogate the informant
by himself? Can the player think up enough good questions on
his own? Can he think of them fast enough to keep the
informant on the defensive? Long, thinking pauses kill
momentum fast.

The solution is to introduce one or more NPCs into the
scene. It doesn't matter if the NPCs are allies or enemies,
neutral or biased, as long as they can help flesh out the
encounter without tipping the balance overwhelmingly away
from the PC.

A rival gang member spots the scene and sneaks in,
thinking to coldcock the PC. However, he spots the
informant and decides to join the fun. The PC must
choose between accepting his rival's help and sharing the
information, taking on both NPCs, or saving the encounter
for another time.

An innocent bystander stumbles upon the PC and his victim
and freezes. This opens up the option of getting some help
if the player plays it smart.

An old drinking buddy happens by and, without hesitation,
jumps in to help.

Be prepared to portray more roles and personalities in
single player games. Perhaps create a chart of unassigned,
pre-fabricated personalities to use on-the-fly whenever an
NPC is needed. Focus on how you can portray each NPC a
little differently to help your player keep track of who
you're roleplaying at any given moment.

It's also beneficial to re-use NPCs as much as possible.
This reduces your workload and helps you develop deeper and
more complex personalities over time. It will help your
player too as they'll remember more NPCs and more about them
through repeat exposure.

Encourage your player to establish roots in the campaign and
take on more responsibility. These things often manifest
into tangible design projects that add new dimensions to
game play, create storytelling opportunities, and can keep
your player busy when you need GM-alone time.

In solo player games, avoid any situation by design where
the PC can reach a point of no return without the
possibility of aid.

A good example is the deep dungeon. What happens if the PC
is sorely wounded in a tough encounter or through a bad dice
roll on level 9? Chances are the character won't be able to
retreat all the way back to the top unless you do some
contriving and fudging.

The tactic of slowly wearing PCs down through minor
encounters is another example. In single PC sessions,
monitor the remaining resources of the character carefully.
Eventually (and sometimes it doesn't take long!) the PC will
have so few options left that the situation becomes
hopeless.

Your best bets are:

"Shallow dungeons" of 1-5 encounters.

Dungeons with many exits so the PC can escape without too
much difficulty when he realizes he's "out of ammo". The
classic D&D module B2 - Keep On The Borderlands is a good
example of this design.

Multiple avenues for aid, such as prisoners to be rescued,
magic pools, potions, and detailed and informational clues.

Good defense options, such as enhanced first aid kits,
anti-venom magic or mundane treatments, temporary
resistances to various foe attacks, secure places of retreat
and convalescence, and so on.

Keep in mind that by dungeon, I mean any adventuring locale,
be it an underground cave system, ruins, a maze of dangers
in the wrong part of town, an abandoned building, and so on.

It's hard to keep a single PC with one hit point or wound
level alive. So, try to focus more on city, town, or village
adventures that are, in general, less lethal.

Keep NPC behaviour civilized as well. This doesn't mean
every foe has impeccable manners; it means murder and
killing are generally avoided.

For example, I recently played in a great battle that was
based almost entirely on non-lethal combat (well, on the
foe's side it was, at least--we PCs are a murderous bunch at
times). Not only did this battle help me learn the D&D 3.5
non-lethal combat rules better, but it imparted the feeling
that my PC was in civilized lands.

In single player games, your player will be more open to
non-lethal combat and civilized adventures than multi-player
groups often are. With no competition for GM and NPC
attention, solo players might even enjoy this type of game
more.

Let the player drive the story and be ready to jump in with
hooks and clues when needed. Railroading a one-player game
has worse consequences than trying to railroad a group (it's
more obvious and more frustrating).

Handing the player the keys involves the following:

GM willingness to let the player create and player trust
in the GM

A fleshed out PC

Clear PC objectives (goals, dreams, motivations)

A clear grasp of the milieu by player and GM

The first three bullets were covered in Issue #194. The last
bullet is required because the player needs to know what's
possible and the GM needs to be able to evaluate
consequences quickly and confidently.

Knowing your game world involves, among other things:

Geography of the local region

Power structure of the campaign area (who controls what
and how, whose power will be disrupted by PC actions and
what will their reaction be)

A cast of NPCs relevant to the PC and background events

Recent and ongoing local events, happenings, and conflicts

Game world design involves more information than can be
covered here, but the fundamental point is to be confident
with running your game world whether it be a pre-created one
or an environment you create on the fly.

Also, avoid having the milieu revolve around the character.
Try to impart in your player the sense that the game world
is bigger than his PC is. This is much easier to do in a
single player game because the GM can be more intimidating
one on one in his various guises (i.e. there's no other
players around for support) and the PC is more vulnerable.

Don't dwell on this during sessions so much because it's OK
for the player to feel like the world spins around the axis
of his PC once in awhile. Do a brief check-up between
sessions and tweak as needed.

This tip synergizes with the Avoid Deep Dungeons tip. Make
adventures short and keep 'em coming at a fast rate. This
maintains session momentum, imparts an ongoing sense of
value and completion for you both, and lets you explore more
ideas.

Without other players around for confirmation and
validation, it's hard for the solo player to measure their
progress. Enabling frequent successes (and challenges) lets
the player know they're doing well.

It's good to have long term, big goals like "overthrow the
evil regime", but ensure the player has at least one goal
that is achievable each session.

With just one player to manage, you can fit more game into
each session. Use this as an opportunity to roleplay.
Develop your NPC portrayal skills. Even if the upcoming
encounter is guaranteed to end up in bloodshed, give the
foes a distinctive feel or memorable behaviour.

For example:

The evil warrior starts the encounter off far away from
the PC, but within yelling distance. As the character
approaches, the fighter yells various insults and bangs his
weapon against his shield, working himself up into a frenzy.

The mindless giant bug goes through a strange ritual
before each attack, much like some batters do in baseball or
goalies do in hockey. The antennae twitch to the left, then
the right, then point at the foe while the mandibles clack
together precisely five times before hacking. This might
seem corny, but it's fun and it works.

Another challenge to provide yourself is to increase the
subtlety of your roleplaying. See how complex, subtle, and
convincing you can be with your NPCs without completely
losing the player and stalling the adventure.

For example, give some of your NPCs a "tell". Create a
distinct mannerism that gives away what an NPC is thinking,
especially if there's a conflict involved, such as:

Lying

Bluffing

Misleading

Understating the truth

Buying time

Knowing friends are eavesdropping nearby

Going against his morals, ethics, or good judgement

Twirl a fake moustache when the barkeep gives his daily
receipts to the PC. Avoid looking in the player's eyes when
an informant provides partial information.

See how subtle you can get because when your player figures
out these "puzzles" they'll be immensely satisfied--
satisfied to the same degree as was the challenge in
noticing and interpreting the behaviour.

Don't worry if the player doesn't notice the tell the first
time. You wouldn't say "you missed a secret door back there,
better go back" would you? :) Instead, allow for repeat
exposure, NPC recycling, and having fun while roleplaying.

* * *

Do you have any single player gaming tips? If so, send them
in to share with the rest of the list at:

I think that to ignore or reduce the importance of equipment
would remove a very rich source of game play. Many good
challenges revolve around having or not having equipment.
Trying to fix the gate to a old ruined fort using your
engineering skills without any tools is much harder. How
your players equip themselves demonstrates how attentively
they are playing in your game world.

We have had many interesting inter-character interactions
where equipment is concerned. For example, a character
argument about whether or not a fire should be made at a
camp while running away. At the heart of the argument was
that it was very cold and one character did not carry any
blankets. For this reason, a fire was eventually built and
the camp was discovered. Such a mundane item played an
intricate role in events. We now have more and more
character banter about events like this bringing the game to
life without me even taking part.

To speed up play time, our character sheets have all the
standard items already in them with a place for how many and
a price. Even clothing with a place for a colour and style.
This speeds things up considerably. To keep my games running
smoothly there are 'shopping-admin' breaks. These are
normally at settlements when there are no actual plot
elements being presented and the players have a chance to
purchase all that stuff. This is usually where one player or
other will make coffee and so on.

While this can be done in numerous ways I find the following
most effective:

Incorporate time intervals into adventures: "Okay, the
note sets up a meeting on the sixth of Deepwinter in the
square of the broken anchor near the docks". Best done
sparingly.

Ask them to train between levels. This takes time (not to
mention money :).

Have them wait for items. One does not simply waltz into a
blacksmith with a pile of ill-gained gold and then calmly
waltz out with half the shop's inventory. Constructing
plate armor takes a lot of time.

Hint at the possibilities of role-playing in habitable
places (cities,towns,villages). (Easy for me, as all my
players have a fixation on joining the nobility.)

Give them a home. Be it a keep (for high-level characters)
or a guild or a house, it will provide a valuable time sink
for them.

Cultivate a friendly relationship with your mage player.
Nothing burns up time like a mage who decides to beat
Elminster in the number of researched spells.

Make sure that the world they play in lives and breathes.
Most of the time players think (a belief spurred on by the
unfortunate nature of video-games) that the world is moved
by them and, should they stop for any length of time, the
world will patiently wait them out. This is easy to solve.
Most of the time all it takes is a couple of details to make
the difference, say:

Your player witness the changing of the seasons, the
coming of harvest time the preparations for winter.

They see a local festival or religious observance.

Kingdoms pass new laws or change subtly in organization.

If they feel that they are in a living world that exists
independent from them and their exploits they will change
their pace to match that of the world. This later becomes an
excellent tool for player manipulation, lulling them into
the slow stately pace of the game world and then springing
some violent disaster that prompts frantic responses from
everybody. Speeding up the pace will leave a distinct
impression on the players.

And the obligatory EvilDM solution: Maim them so badly in
the last adventure that it takes at least four weeks for the
baneful effects to wear off.

We rotate the GM-ship in our games, so during the time that
we have been playing, I have played three games and DM'd
one. When we started out at first level, equipment
management wasn't too big of a deal; but now that we are
eighth level it is becoming more of a headache.

We usually use a porter/street urchin/inn keeper to fetch
mundane equipment (sunrods, caltrops, torches and the like)
and will pay a little extra premium for the service. And
while we do use electronic character tools (eTools) to keep
track of our characters, it still can be a pain to keep
track of potions/scrolls and other items. This has also made
the gathering of equipment, found as loot, to become a major
time drag for both the DM and the players.

How many times has a player wrote down a potion/scroll only
to have it sit there on the character sheet and never get
used? Or what if items on the master loot list don't get
distributed or are lost or accidentally duplicated? What if
the loot tracker misspells the baddies' name and the DM has
to spend 15 minutes flipping through the module to identify
something you killed three sessions ago? Also, it is a very
big pain to erase and re-write down frequently used items
such as healing potions.

What I did to help alleviate some of the issues is the
following. I purchased several packs of white and neon
colored (green, yellow, pink, orange & blue) 3x5 index
cards. When an item is discovered on a fallen enemy the
player will write down the item on a certain color card as
well as any descriptive information that the DM can give
about that encounter/enemy/room that will help him/her look
up the information whenever the party gets around to
identifying it. We happen to use the following color schema
(tending to run through the yellow and green fastest)

The items can be distributed on the spot to the rest of the
players or after they have been identified. Once identified,
the price of an item (as well as any charges/caster
level/etc.) is also added to the card so that if it needs to
be liquidated the sell price can be taken as a percentage
of the MSRP. Potions, scrolls and wands are kept on cards
and then destroyed once depleted/used. Duplicate scrolls and
potions can be added to the same card, but whenever it is
used, the item is scratched through with a pen or some other
permanent marker. Magical items are identified and a player
selected to receive the item. At that point he/she takes the
card and does not destroy it until it is integrated onto
their character sheet.

For an advanced usage, we use a simple 1-hole punch to put a
hole in the top right corner and then the use a single
binder ring to keep them together. In addition, frequently
used items, such as healing potions, can be laminated as
permanent tokens that are taken away when used and given
back as they buy more.

This system is working out supremely well in the
organization and distribution of equipment. In addition, when
the players get in a bind or during down time, they tend to
flip through their specialty items to see if they have
something that can pull their characters out of the
proverbial fire. This gets the players more familiar with
what they are carrying, cuts down on the amount of times we
have print and re-print our character sheets from the
computer (saving both paper and expensive ink), and makes
identifying and distributing items MUCH faster.

My group has run a few different evil games and we've come
to these conclusions:

The overall story can easily get corrupted (hacked apart,
so to speak) because of idea that instead of just looking
for adventure, or the holy grail, or whatever, some of the
characters are also looking to get a leg up on the other
party membersÉ

Often a keep, castle, or whatever, helps a lot since many
of the machinations of the players take space, take time,
and it's good to have a home base for your evil plots in the
night.

A well-defined land, or city, or whatever the players are
expected to spend the most time in, helps a lot since then
the characters can start plotting with local thieves'
guilds, evil barons, terrorizing the local populace, etc.

A fair number of evil campaigns are driven by greed.
Often they will start on a trek because of some promised
loot and more often than not, not worrying about giving
whatever it is to whoever might have hired them to find it.
Myself and other DMs have had campaigns start off from
simple mentions of a dragon hoard or excessively rich towns
to the north (the player decided they would rob the entire
town).

Evil characters in our campaigns often only get along
because of a respect for the other group members' skills. A
healthy fear of dying trying to steal from the lawful evil
monk will stop you from attempting to rob him blind. That
being said, we almost always have one PC try to kill another
in games. Not all PCs of course, but some of them just don't
get along. We have a group of around 5-7 people so that can
mean a lot more interaction between players.

The DM is never prepared for what the party is going to
do next. For instance, we had a person enter our evil game
late. I was playing a wizard who specialized in controlling
minds and another was playing a monk whose main goal in life
was to build a monastery.

We both had built up a pretty big reputation with the group
and with the locals, so people didn't mess with us much.
When this new player joined, he decided to create an uber
assassin who believed himself invincible and was also really
annoying. Didn't take but 10 minutes for him to get pissed
off enough to attack the monk (to show him who was boss, so
to speak), but he had turned his back to me to do so. I
charmed him and that was that (I owned him for a week at
that point).

We realized he would just try to kill us as soon as the week
was up, so we searched for and found a potion of
forgetfulness and had the assassin tell us his full life
story. We then had him drink the potion, wake up on one of
our beds and convinced him he been summoned by us because of
how good he is. We had brought him here to help us, but he
had to listen to us or we'd just send him back. We used his
known life story to convince him we knew everything about
him. 2-3 hours later the game was half over and we hadn't
even left the keep. We all had a great time, but none of us
expected it to go down that way nor that just the
introduction of a character would take that long.

I recommend role-playing games as a positive means to
encourage cooperative behavior in siblings.

Here's why:

The other evening I was desperate for a way to get my boys
out of the whiny "I don't have anything to do so trying to
kill my brother is a good idea" phase. I pulled down my old
seldom-used copy of the Dragon Strike game and got it out.
Of course they weren't interested, so I just went ahead and
started laying it out on the table and setting up the
simplest scenario. And, of course, by the time I was halfway
through I was receiving pointed and increasingly sarcastic
comments about my setup speed or lack thereof.

My sons are both adopted and were 5 and 2 when I adopted
them; now 9 and 6. They had spent their entire lives before
adoption in an orphanage in Latin America. The older is
bipolar and ADHD and the younger is incredibly smart (and
smart-mouthed) and hyperactive. Both boys had to literally
fight for their food in the orphanage and I have spent the
last 4 years trying to civilize them, with limited success.
I don't often let them play with kids their own age, for
example, 'cause the other kids end up crying and I end up
explaining to angry parents. I have had to deter well-
meaning but ignorant interference from various outsiders
several times because they literally thought the older boy
was trying to kill the younger.

Anyway, that's just to set the stage for what happened in
this game.

As GM I modified the rules to make combat simpler. This was
to make the game more accessible to my older son (short
attention span, over-excitation leads to instant rages) and
my younger son (who, although he is bright, is after all,
only 6).

The scenario was for the adventurers to work together to
rescue a captured wizard from a dungeon. My intent was to
introduce the boys to RPGs with the idea in mind that I'd
see more cooperative behavior by the time they were (say) 18
or so.

Until halfway through the game they were totally at odds,
with the older (warrior character) accusing the younger
(archer elf character) of being too young to play (almost
correct) and the younger taking off on his own to find
something to fight because it was more fun fighting and
dying alone than cooperating.

Finally I began to twig to the idea that as GM I could
influence their behavior by rewarding good behavior and
punishing bad behavior. Rewards were funny and/or silly
comments that made them giggle. Punishment was a bombastic
statement that the universe was going into stasis for 10
seconds until the gods were no longer offended by the lowly
characters' behavior. This was not only effective, it served
to focus their attention more on the goals of the game.
Anything longer than 10 seconds would simply not have
worked, given the ADHD / hyperactivity.

Finally, my older son found the wizard and was on his own
trying to fight the monster jailor, with little success. He
had one 10d die to roll against the monster's 8d/10d/12d
dice rolls. His brother, seeing the fighting as fun, got
into the fray as well, but they were both losing by fighting
separately. My older son then asked if they could combine
their die and roll together as one combined character. As GM
I instantly modified the rules to allow it. The moment they
both realized they were winning the fight, they cooperated
flawlessly. I was astounded. I had NEVER seen this level of
cooperation before in the last 4 years.

Of course, the moment they defeated the monster and had to
cooperate to carry the wizard back to the dungeon exit, it
was another story. However, given the brief success, I was
unwilling to let them revert, so I amended the game and my
approach to place the dungeon dragon on the table and make
his presence incredibly intimidating. They cooperated again
and scurried off with the wizard, and won the game.

We all won.

What did I learn?

Don't let the game rules stand in the way of achieving
your greater aim in parenting.

Cooperation can be achieved if the external enemy
outweighs the internal enmity.

Role-playing can be a very intense emotional experience,
especially for younger kids, and you must be careful in
your approach.

Used with loving care, RPGs are positive for kids.

None of us immediately converted to Satanism as a result
of playing the game. Go figure. ;-)